Acquisition Announcement: Broken by Marisca Pichette.
Heroic Books have acquired Marisca Pichette’s dark and original first novel, due to be released in August 2022.
No one escapes the Comb.
This is the truth that Cici has come to accept. There was a time when she dreamed of a life beyond the slums — but dreams, she’s learned, are for the soon-to-be dead.
So when she and her friend Rox find a precious silver trenion, Cici can scarcely believe her luck. A new life beckons, one free from the filth and violence of the street.
But things don’t go to plan. When Cici’s life is saved by Hôhn, a Subnatural assassin sworn to kill any who see his face, a forbidden friendship blossoms. Covertly, they must avert a war — for if their bond is discovered, it will mean their deaths.
Marisca Pichette said: ‘Broken has been in the works for almost a decade. When I began writing the novel — and then the trilogy — the dream of publication was a phantasm I hardly dared to entertain. I went through stages of loving and hating the books, and frustration at a publishing market that seemed to have no place for them.
Heroic and I found each other through a Twitter pitch contest. I am enormously grateful to the Heroic team for taking a chance with Broken, including all the fantastic work with cover design, refining the manuscript, and lining up the launch. I am so excited to share this story with readers, and hope to follow through on the promise I made in my query letter: to bring you “queer assassins, reluctant gods, poisonous politics — and what happens when one man decides history needs revision.”’
Marisca Pichette is an author of poetry and prose, meandering from speculative worlds into the weeds of literary nonfiction. She began writing in high school, studying linguistics and crafting languages for her work. Since then, she has published short fiction, nonfiction, and poetry internationally, in print and online. She earned her Bachelor of Arts from Mount Holyoke College and is a graduate of the Stonecoast MFA program. A lover of moss and monsters, she lives in Western Massachusetts, amidst a horde of houseplants and books.
